NYT reports. … Continue reading
Category Archives: chicanery
NBC News: McCrae Dowless, the man whose “get-out-the-vote” activities are the center of the election fraud investigation in North Carolina, told a local political campaign volunteer that he was holding onto 800 absentee ballots, according to a new affidavit obtained … Continue reading
Charlotte Observer: Bladen County election workers tallied the results of early voting before Election Day in violation of state rules and are accused of allowing outsiders to view them, a precinct worker wrote in an affidavit released by state Democrats. The … Continue reading
Charlie Savage in the NYT: President Trump defended himself on Monday against prosecutors’ accusation that he directed illegal payments ahead of the 2016 election to two women to stay silent about alleged extramarital affairs with him, insisting that the payments were “a … Continue reading
I have written this piece for Slate. It begins: President Donald Trump may never face a criminal penalty or impeachment proceedings for violating campaign finance laws in alleged conspiracy with his former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen. But on Monday, he … Continue reading
This Chicago Tribune story shows us how little has changed since Abner Mikva’s “we don’t want nobody nobody sent: To get on the ballot, Krupa was required to file 473 valid signatures of ward residents with the Chicago Board of … Continue reading
Politico: “They pick these people who’ve self-destructed their life, then they’re guinea pigs for whatever comes along to make a dollar,” said Sarah Jane Benson, whose family owns a restaurant in Bladenboro. “If it hadn’t been McCrae, it’d been somebody … Continue reading
NYT: In the memo in the case of Mr. Cohen, prosecutors from the Southern District of New York depicted Mr. Trump, identified only as “Individual-1,” as an accomplice in the hush payments. While Mr. Trump was not charged, the reference echoed Watergate, when … Continue reading
From the sentencing memo: During the campaign, Cohen played a central role in two similar schemes to purchase the rights to stories – each from women who claimed to have had an affair with Individual-1 – so as to suppress … Continue reading
Great to talk to June Grasso of Bloomberg Law. Listen. … Continue reading
NYT: The congressional campaign of Mark Harris disclosed late Thursday night that it owed more than $34,000 in connection with an absentee ballot and voter turnout operation that has prompted fears of election fraud and called the North Carolina Republican’s … Continue reading
WaPo reports. … Continue reading
BuzzFeed reports. … Continue reading
Details. … Continue reading
WaPo: When GOP Rep. Robert Pittenger lost his primary by a narrow margin in May, he suspected something was amiss. The congressman turned to a group of friends and family who had gathered with him on election night at a … Continue reading
CNN: North Carolina GOP director open to new election in disputed House race The executive director of the North Carolina Republican Party says he supports a new election if allegations of fraud in the 9th Congressional District race are proven true … Continue reading
Harry Enten analysis for CNN: The North Carolina State Board of Elections and Ethics last week voted against certifying Republican Mark Harris’ 905 vote win over Democrat Dan McCready in the state’s 9th Congressional District. In the days since, allegations of election fraud involving … Continue reading
BuzzFeed: The allegations that Republicans tampered with absentee ballots in a close North Carolina election represent the most serious federal election tampering case in years, one that allegedly stole votes from elderly black voters in the state’s rural south. Now two women intimately involved with McCrae … Continue reading
WSOC reports. … Continue reading
Politico: The House GOP campaign arm suffered a major hack during the 2018 election, exposing thousands of sensitive emails to an outside intruder, according to three senior party officials. The email accounts of four senior aides at the National Republican … Continue reading
Judd Legum: The envelopes of the absentee ballots are a rich source of information because they require not only the signature of the voter but the signature of two witnesses. Pending an investigation by the North Carolina State Board of … Continue reading
Open Secrets: Notorious “dark money” conduit Wellspring Committee gave $14.8 million to the primary spender on Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation and paid $919,900 to the mysterious LLC that made a $1 million donation to President Donald Trump’s inaugural committee, according … Continue reading
Here's another affidavit from a Bladen absentee voter. One reason why state officials apparently looking into such cases. #ncpol #nc9 #ncga pic.twitter.com/qC1EpVLsXp — Jim Morrill (@jimmorrill) November 29, 2018 Charlotte Observer editorial: Aha! NC voter fraud does exist. (Just not … Continue reading
Kirk Ross at WaPo: North Carolina election officials are investigating possible irregularities with absentee ballots in the state’s 9th Congressional District, refusing to certify the race weeks after Election Day. Unofficial results show Mark Harris, a Republican, defeating Democrat Dan … Continue reading
The plot thickens. … Continue reading
BuzzFeed: Right before the election, Brian Kemp, at the time Georgia’s secretary of state and the Republican candidate for governor, announced an investigation into state Democrats, claiming they’d hacked him. He said he’d alerted federal authorities. Now, more than two … Continue reading
NYT: They are a familiar sight at farmers’ markets and public squares across California every election season: workers gathering signatures needed to place voter initiatives on the ballot. Nine people have been charged with felony election fraud after they went … Continue reading
Tampa Bay Times: The Florida Democratic Party has hired an investigator to dig into altered “cure affidavit” forms sent out to voters whose mail-in ballots had missing or non-matching signatures, according to a statement released by the party’s lawyer. “Upon … Continue reading
The Miami Herald reports. … Continue reading
Trentonian: A former chief investigator of Mercer County elections has been charged with voter fraud after officials learned she resides in Pennsylvania, yet has voted in New Jersey since at least 2012. Andrea Palmucci-McGillicuddy, 52, is charged with fraudulent voting, … Continue reading
Lame duck shenanigans. … Continue reading
Naples Daily News: A day after Florida’s election left top state races too close to call, a Democratic party leader directed staffers and volunteers to share altered election forms with voters to fix signature problems on absentee ballots after the state’s deadline. … Continue reading
WaPo: Several pro-Trump Facebook pages and one Twitter account on Monday posted the home address and phone number of the Broward County, Fla., election supervisor who has been the target of blistering criticism from the president and other Republicans amid … Continue reading
Bob Bauer for The Atlantic: It is a strange turn of events when a president famous for denouncing “fake news” is discovered to have entered into an agreement with a media organization to finance the concealment of very real but politically … Continue reading
Philip Bump for WaPo. … Continue reading
WSJ: As a presidential candidate in August 2015, Donald Trump huddled with a longtime friend, media executive David Pecker, in his cluttered 26th floor Trump Tower office and made a request. What can you do to help my campaign? he … Continue reading
Banana republic stuff spreads. Marc Caputo and Matt Dixon for Politico: Gov. Rick Scott announced Thursday night that he was calling for a state investigation into Broward County’s handling of tens of thousands of ballots that have led to statewide … Continue reading
Reuters: If the goals of spreading divisive content have remained the same, the methods have evolved in multiple ways, researchers say. For one, there has been less reliance on pure fiction. People have been sensitized to look for completely false … Continue reading
WhoWhatWhy: WhoWhatWhy asked the secretary of state’s office if it planned to conduct an audit to ascertain that unauthorized changes had not been made to voter registrations. Broce responded, “There is no such vulnerability in the system as alleged by your … Continue reading
Politico: House Democrats have exploited campaign finance law to pay rent for dozens of campaign offices used by their candidates in 2018 — an arrangement that’s further padded the party’s massive financial advantage in the midterms even as Republicans cry … Continue reading
I have written this piece for Slate. It begins: In perhaps the most outrageous example of election administration partisanship in the modern era, Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp, who is running for governor while simultaneously in charge of the … Continue reading
Y’all Politics. … Continue reading
Bob Bauer and Ryan Goodman for Just Security. … Continue reading
NJ.com: Frank “Pupie” Raia, a real-estate developer and major figure in Hoboken politics for decades, was indicted by a federal grand jury Wednesday and accused of overseeing a cash-for-votes operation during the city’s 2013 municipal race. Prosecutors allege Raia, 67, directed an … Continue reading
HuffPost: HuffPost’s April 2016 report investigated the tactics of End Citizens United, a political action committee founded by three former staffers at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the party’s official organ dedicated to electing Democrats to the House of Representatives. … Continue reading
NYT: A structure unknown even to some of those involved, Floridians for a Fair Shake and 13 other groups around the country are funded and coordinated out of a single office in Washington, with the goal of battering Republicans for … Continue reading
NBC News: When Naim Tyler tweeted a video on Nov. 8, 2016, that showed an alleged voting machine malfunction in favor of Hillary Clinton, he expected some attention. But he didn’t realize what was about to happen. The video he … Continue reading
Here’s the complaint from the newest members of the Fraudulent Fraud Squad. As Adam Smith flags from page 16: Hmm! https://t.co/gYTkyUISiW pic.twitter.com/643MZlkllS — Adam Smith (@asmith83) October 19, 2018 The 11 California counties claim came from Judicial Watch. More … Continue reading